His recommendations may surprise you, especially if you're eager for our next president to roll up his sleeves and get started making waves early. There are some things the president-elect should do swiftly, writes Hess -- among them: assemble the White House staff; identify the key national security, homeland security, and economic security nominees; bring Congress into the act from day one in office. But at least as many of Hess's recommendations appeal to caution -- avoid actions that "use up precious political capital and spill blood in the waters"; be careful about magnanimous gestures of bipartisanship; "Take a cue from Lincoln in 1860 and FDR in 1932" and "wait your turn" to get started (even if the lame duck president calls for you to step up); and finally, "Break glass only in case of emergency" -- in other words, show the respect for those outside of your administration that has been lacking over the past eight years.

Mitchell compliments Hess for creating "a kind of 'Cliff Notes' or 'Transitions for Dummies,'" giving "interested observers an opportunity to evaluate this presidential transition, just like symphony-goers who take musical scores to concerts to know whether the conductor and the orchestra got it right."

Hess's guide is indeed valuable in helping the public to evaluate the actions of the president-elect and newly-installed over the coming months. But Americans do not fully discharge their civic duty when they finish at the polls on November 4, writes Carolyn Lukensmeyer of America Speaks.

For all of us who have been dedicated to revitalizing democracy in our country, our attention must stay just as focused after the election as it has been for the last months. The challenge immediately after the election is how to keep all of these hundreds of thousands, even millions of people engaged in creating our national community and taking on the tough choices that we are facing the economy, healthcare, immigration, energy.

Think about your community - what the avenues for people to stay engaged after the election? Are there things you can do to help make this happen? I hope you will find a few other folks who care about this as much as you do and discover what you can do together.

America Speaks works to "engage citizens in governance." At first that idea might strike you as asking too much of an electorate that is considered "energized" when it simply registers in greater numbers to vote. But remember the multitude of articles that hit newsstands after the first round of elections in Iraq produced proud voters but more violence? "Democracy is more than elections," was the consensus most observers reached. Whether the end-goal is peaceful co-existence or serious policy reform, citizens in a democracy must become active constituents for change.

This principle holds in the United States too. See America Speaks' Agenda for Democratic Reform for ideas on how we could do a better job at bringing Americans into the decision making process even after they've cast their votes.

This entry is cross-posted on Chasing the Flame.